


Architects of Heaven

by wearwind



Series: Verdant Wind [5]
Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Claude is a Professional Loser, F/M, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Golden Deer Route, Gen, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Reunions, verdant wind
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-07
Updated: 2021-01-30
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:41:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 16,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25697482
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wearwind/pseuds/wearwind
Summary: Claude returns to Garreg Mach in the hopes to reunite with the one woman he needs most. Instead, he finds a crumbling ruin, a spring, and a goddess.Or: a longfic on hope, loss, arrogance, Leicester scheming, and strangers searching for a way back together.
Relationships: My Unit | Byleth/Claude von Riegan
Series: Verdant Wind [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1734619
Comments: 32
Kudos: 78
Collections: Claudeleth Week 2020





	1. Reunion at Dawn

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Claudeleth week, and welcome to wearwind's newest longfic! This particular work has a few godparents, without whom it would look VASTLY different and decidedly less interesting:
> 
> \- evil_bunny_king, who not only has inspired the very idea for the whole thing with a timely song suggestion, but also kindly beta'd the chapter below TWICE;
> 
> \- Iris_the_Messenger, the certified Bane of My Existence & tandem writing Claudeleth bud, who helped with brainstorming the title and delivered the other beta,
> 
> \- verdantstars, who has shared the secrets of her structural approach to writing, and took apart this chapter to identify improvement areas. Stars is also responsible for this hasty wind actually identifying my goal for this fic: learn to take my time with outlining, as well as to action the outline elements into chapters. This might mean that the updates will be slow - monthly, mayhaps - but hoo boy, will they be thought-out for once.
> 
> A shoutout to the other people that made this fic happen: the whole merry band of Claudeleth Mach, with their general high spirits, incisive advice, and madly supportive attitudes. I am SO VERY HAPPY I get to share the internets with them. 
> 
> This is my entry for Claudeleth Week, Day 4: Reunion/Pining.

_I'm not one to ever pray for mercy_

_Or to wish on pennies in the fountain or the shrine_

_But that day you know I left my money_

_And I thought of you only_

_All that copper glowing fine_

_And I wonder what became of you_

_What became of you_

_The Shrine / An Argument,_ Fleet Foxes

  
  


“Stalemate,” said Nader, pushing his remaining knight into position, and with one flick of his thick hand he knocked down both kings. They fell on the wood with a hollow thud. The embellished chessboard was half-empty, pine-white and ebony-black pieces scattered around the cold marble of the palace floor. “Again. Listen, kiddo -- you sure you don’t want to do this properly?”

“And what would be the point?” asked Claude, more defeated than frustrated. He leaned over the board, scanning the meagre remainders of his defences, and absent-mindedly set the kings upright. 

He could feel Nader’s eyes on his head. The concern in them was blatant, badly hidden in the thick bushes of his beard.

“I’m just a simple man,” Nader said, “and you could probably tie my whole head in like a corset lace, but I’m pretty sure you can’t win a game with an incomplete set.”

Claude did not answer, focus narrowing on the sprawl of black-and-white fields before him. Nader waited a long moment, sighed, and bent down with a groan to gather the scattered pawns.

“About Edmund,” he said. “You’re not gonna pay that cheap bastard, are you?”

“He sent through a troops report,” Claude said and rubbed his thumbs against his temples, working out the residual headache that immediately flared up at the thought. “And Gloucester supports it. I will argue it down as much as I can - I mean, I doubt he’s expecting more than _half_ of what he’s listed - but I don’t think we can wiggle out of covering this cost entirely.”

Nader squinted at him. “That’s gonna reduce the number of mouths you can feed. By a long shot.”

“Good thing we’re not _technically_ at war, eh? I’ll tie a few troop conditions to it. He’ll be too elated with money to read through them.” Claude pulled his lips into a tired smile, and Nader gave him another concerned glance. He snorted, waving it away with a dismissive hand.

“Hey, don’t give me that look, old man. Grandpa’s coffers are one of the few assets we do have left.” He moved his single rook into the starting position. “Last one before we retire for the night? I’ll go easy on you.”

Nader harrumphed, but sat back up. The pieces knocked against the chessboard in quick succession, neither of them shy in their opening gambits.

Claude smiled under his breath. For all the old man complained about his own slow wits, Claude had yet to see him show any mercy. If it had been Claude’s choice to discard his own pieces, then so it would be: far be it from _Nader the Undefeated_ to deny himself an advantage.

And neither would the Empire at his doorstep, bold with righteousness and ravenous for his pawns. 

It would be over in fifteen moves, his king trapped between a queen, knight, and advancing pawn. Claude moved his rook, completing the gambit, and rubbed his eyes as Nader scanned the board for any option other than the obvious.

Five years, and all he could do on a shaken board was scramble to defend. Yet again, a bitterly humorous voice in his head said, he’s inherited a losing side; his white-pine Leicester legacy was coward-made. Force a draw rather than a loss. Make a _strategic retreat_ to live another day. A draw after a draw after a draw –

It was no point getting used to relying on pieces he did not have. 

“Oof,” Nader said, knocking Claude’s single rook off the board and completing the stalemate. “I’m not playin’ with you again, kiddo. This just doesn’t feel right.”

“Don’t you pity me, you old sap,” said Claude. “Save it for when I’m not giving you a fight.”

Nader sighed, fondly. “As if that’s ever gonna happen.” Then he had extended his bear-like arm, a white piece tucked in between his hairy fingers. “At least take the queen. On the house. So at least it feels like a proper victory when I wipe the palace floor with your sorry excuse of an army.”

“No,” Claude said, hand curling around his sash. “Not yet.”

The _look_ Nader gave him was almost worthy of his mother. 

“Look, kid--”

“Have you spoken to Judith about who signs off the missives while I’m gone?” Claude said and knelt on the floor to pluck the scattered pieces from their hiding spots under a cabinet. “You need to keep your wits about you when it comes to Roundtable correspondence. If it’s good, use my seal. If it’s not, let Judith deal with it. And if it’s outrageous-- just burn it and pretend the messenger got lost, all right? They’ll follow up if it’s important.”

“I think I can handle a bunch of Fódlani chatter for a week or so,” Nader said. “Don’t you order me around, kiddo. You just go fly around for a lil’ bit, should be good for you.”

Claude chuckled and locked up the chessboard. _You just go fly around._ Nader Al-Khalim’s eternal advice, be it a scraped knee or a broken heart. “They’re going to eat you alive, aren’t they?”

“Not more than they’re already eatin’ you,” said Nader.

“My fault for being delicious,” said Claude. “Might be longer than _a week or so_ , you know that. There’s someone I have to meet.”

Something in the bushes of Nader’s beard shifted. Claude’s exhausted brain took a moment to identify it, but when it finally did, it jerked in alarm. It had been concern before; now, it was pity mixed with disquiet.

“You,” his general said slowly, “need to _sleep_.”

Claude glanced to the side, where the four-year-old portrait of Duke Oswald loomed over his head from over the office desk. _You just had to die and leave me alone in the most inconvenient moment, you old grump._

No matter what Nader might think of the state of his head, he had a fervent hope that this applied to his grandfather only.

“That’s what this little trip will be about,” he lied. “Resting, you know? And a quick reunion with old pals. Goodnight, _Nardel._ ”

Nader’s thick moustache twitched. “Goodnight, _Claude._ Get that brain of yours screwed on a little tighter. And have some shut-eye.”

After the heavy walnut doorway clicked shut behind him, Claude flopped flat on the floor, resting the back of his head against the cool marble floor. The frescoes of the ceiling wove overhead, green Riegan crescents draped in glittering gold. The other Crests surrounded it from four sides; on a good day, Claude would call it _supportive._ On a bad--

There was still the matter of Gloucester.

“And if you don’t sleep through the night,” called Nader from the corridor, “I’m havin’ Huma chew through all your paperwork!”

Claude chortled, listening to his fading footfalls. His own fingers curled again around a metal piece bound to his sash, cold against his feverish skin. Then he jumped to his feet, pulled at a candelabra, and disappeared in the dark depths of the opening ducal tunnel. 

*** 

The night was looming low as he flew up into the empty skies, the rapidly falling cold sending his teeth chattering. The blinking lights of Derdriu gave way, palace and city fading out through the thick veil of clouds, ant-like in size of its people, griefs, and dreams. 

They flew higher still, high enough for the frost to gather on his wyvern’s horns, and Claude craned his head skyward to stare at the stars blinking into existence.

Judith would have a _fit_ to find him gone in the morning - and Nader would not be surprised at all.

The earth beneath his feet disappeared in the sea of black, the yawning maw of the night extending until there was only him and Huma left beyond it – and a few distant pinpricks shining pale and stoic in the black firmament. He took a deep breath – felt it freeze him to the bone – let the leather reins fall from his stiff fingers, leaning to lay his back along the spiked spine of his wyvern – and allowed himself a moment of sincerity.

Come morning, the sun would rise over the Millennium Festival.

It was a fool’s errand and a fool’s hope. But Claude von Riegan never fancied himself a wise man.

“Enough stalemate,” he whispered, hard-cut syllables of Fódlani speech falling off his tongue like anchoring weights. His fingers closed on the figurine tied to his sash: a golden, crowned chess piece. “You gonna spearhead my advance for me, Teach?”

*** 

He awoke before the paling of the sky, jolting to consciousness to the sounds of crunching bones. In the grey pre-dawn light, Huma gave him an uninterested glance, and then proceeded to bite into the gory ribcage of a light-brown stag.

“Hey,” Claude said, slightly breathless, and let go of his knife. “Bad wyvern. No eating of holy symbols.”

The wyvern ignored him. Save the grisly sounds of her feast, the forest he’d chosen for their nightly rest was eerily quiet, nightbirds and smaller animals driven away by the overwhelming wyvern stench. Mist was pearling on the plates of his armour, his fingers numb from the cold.

He nudged Huma’s wing until she opened it enough to shield him from the wind. Resting against her warm stomach, he drank from the waterskins until his own belly was full, and then clinked its metal mouth against her scales. 

“Happy Millennium Festival,” he said.

They made the rest of the climb on foot. Closer to the monastery, the mountainside was charred with black magic, old tree stumps covered by toxic purple mould. The ruins loomed ahead, dark, grey, and unwelcoming. 

They flew across the shaky drawbridge and over the ruined gate, the gigantic doorway that had once guarded the main entrance lying in splinters on both sides - a reminder of a demonic beast's onslaugh. He had fought in close quarters that day. It’d had a battering ram mounted in between its tar-slick shoulder blades, and it had broken through the gate with an ear-splitting roar—

Blinking the memory away, he slid off Huma’s back to land on the ruined courtyard. 

Ahead of him lay the rubble of his former home. The grey, dead waters of the pond; the cracked windows of the greenhouse; and the struggling bulk of the monastery itself, crumbling under the weight of caved-in ceilings. The great hall he had once sped through to make his morning sword practice lay hollow, deserted – empty in a cold, detached way that belied any human history at all. As if he were coming back here after five _centuries_ , not years.

Before the dawn of its thousandth birthday, Garreg Mach Monastery lay still and deserted. 

Claude walked through the courtyard, every step settling more weight on his shoulders.

He stopped at the foot of the cracked fountain, the old spring still trickling water into the cracked, overgrown foundations. On the worn enamel of the basin, he could still see the scattered coppers: luckless and green with patina.

 _Hey, goddess, here’s one especially for you!_ Raphael had bellowed as he’d tossed the entire bag’s worth of coin into the fountain. Claude had made a mental note to replenish it later, else their merry giant would have no money left for breakfast. The ball had shimmered around them, students in ball gowns flowing in and out of the glittering hallways. The night sky had been bright with fireworks. _That’s one each for the luck of all of Golden Deer!_

 _You could just wish for luck for all on_ one _penny,_ Leonie had said, dropping hers. The rest of the Deer had followed, leaving him a step behind. Hilda had tugged at his yellow sleeve.

_You’re not going to need any luck up ahead, Mr. House Leader?_

He’d laughed. _Hey, you know me, Hilda. I make my own. What does the goddess have to do with it?_

 _Well,_ I _think,_ Lysithea had said sternly, _that this contrarian attitude of yours is not going to get you any luck at the Roundtable._

 _Yes,_ Lorenz had added, dropping his own gold coin, _I, for one, shall wish for a wise man to sit at the Alliance’s steer._

_Also, why would you ruin a perfectly cute thing—_ Hilda had said. 

_Hey, hey,_ Claude had said with a laugh, putting his hands up. _Alright, I know when I’ve been outvoted. Anyone got a copper?_

There had been a general huff. Raphael had patted his own uniform up and down – but Claude had been startled to see Marianne’s gentle, hopeful eyes over a hand extended towards him. A gold-rimmed coin had lain on her palm, its head a goddess with copper-green hair.

 _You need all the luck the goddess can give you,_ she’d said, meek and hopeful. _I… I want to see the world you’re going to make._

He had stilled, then. A fire had built up in his stomach: that had been what it felt like to be believed in. 

Then – then war came to Garreg Mach, and he fled to Derdriu, alone –

Claude blinked away the memory, the dreamlike figures of his old flatmates disappearing in the pre-dawn grey. The coppers in the fountains were just that: coppers. Hopes thrown into the water to mark their tangibility. Just a flourish, pretty symbolism masking the pointlessness of wishes without effort.

And yet, against all logic, he had thrown the goddess’s head with another face in mind, and _wished_.

The pale light of the coming sunrise ahead, he followed the trail of debris across the courtyard. Jumping through the rubble and fallen Saint statues, he crossed the entrance hall and eyed the unsteady bridge to the cathedral.

Huma nudged his shoulder.

“No,” Claude murmured. “Have a look— you won’t land in there.” As if on cue, loose stones tumbled from the narrow foothold that held the cathedral. The onslaught of the demonic beasts had spared the integrity of the monastery’s sturdier build, but the cathedral had been the centre of their attack – and it seemed that it now barely stood on its lone mountaintop, its spired roof completely caved in. 

Only the furthest wall stood untarnished; the stained glass of the rosette window shone red and gold in the dawn mist. It woke a painful, vibrating longing inside his chest.

He set a cautious foot on the drawbridge. It creaked ominously. Huma squeaked, taking flight to hover next to him.

“You are a worrywart,” he told her. The wind rocked the bridge, and he crouched low, picking the sturdiest planks to slowly approach the cathedral. Ten steps remaining – five – two – 

_Claude,_ Byleth had said, appearing on the bridge out of nowhere and he’d swerved in his wild run, _why is it that you never attend the choir practice?_

 _After my secrets, are you?_ he’d teased, grinning. _That’ll cost you, Teach. Why is it that you will never tell me the real reason for your hair colour and Rhea’s?_

Byleth had looked at him, blank-faced, and handed him the hymnbook. _Just because you don’t know the words doesn’t make this practice useless. I want you to_ all _know the basis of healing magic before the end of the month. And,_ she’d added, disappearing as quickly as she’d cornered him, _I know you’ve got the voice for it._

 _Wait,_ he’d said, _how do you know about my singing voice--_

The rotten plank gave in under his feet. He windmilled his arms wildly, but it was too late – he was in freefall, the vast chasm opening up under him, nightlights of Abyss blinking out in the dawn – 

Razor-sharp claws closed around his chest, carrying him up. His empty stomach churned, bile welling up in his throat.

Huma squawked. Claude laughed, wild and only slightly hysterical. “Well done. _Worrywart._ Leave me there, but don’t land – you’re too heavy, this place could come down with a stronger breeze, look at it-”

The claws tightened around him. Then the wyvern flew closer to the narrow foothold, dropping him over the rubble from a height larger than strictly necessary. He rolled on fall, bow trained on the open entrance.

The ruin was deathly quiet. The dawn rose ahead of him, and second by second, the stained glass shone brighter with an otherworldly light. Nothing rustled nor moved in the rubble, no shadow moved through the sides. 

The cathedral was dead.

Anxiety welling up in his throat, Claude made a way step closer – then, when the ruin did not crumble below him, another. The shadows were growing longer behind him. 

_No-one came._

Or, he corrected himself meticulously, not just yet. 

He walked up to the altar, absent-mindedly brushing off a layer of dust from the marbled surface. It left a grey, ashen smudge on his glove. Then, lips curving at the thought of _what would Seteth say,_ he pushed himself up to sit on the top, and waited.

 _Ignatz should be the first to arrive,_ he thought. It would be a sight to break his gentle soul to pieces. The dilapidated ruin, stained glass untouched in the single standing wall; and then, resting blasphemously on the cracked alter, a gold-clad rascal. He would commission that painting and hang it in the palace throne room just to spite the Gloucesters.

 _Or Hilda._ Last time he’d heard from her, she was still cooped up in Goneril, sending perfumed letters and complaining about the _boredom,_ what with the lack of Almyran attacks, and could he please call Holst for a war council again because he was getting on her nerves ever so much. And, within every letter, an off-handed hint: _Earl Ernest’s wife has been passing on ridiculous rumours about you lately. I told her you would never feed her dog under the table - that would require you actually leaving scraps from a meal!_

There was no Earl Ernest, but there was an uneasy Edmund ally, and rumours of a poisoning. 

_Or Marianne,_ he thought, imagining her wide eyes at his casual claiming of the altar. _Or Leonie - she would not be impressed. Raphael - he’d just crush my ribs - Lysithea’d tell me to stop acting like a brat -_

Or --

He dangled his feet against the altar, kicking up a cloud of dust that caught the sharp rays of the rising sun. Absentmindedly, he palmed the missive that sat bound to his sash, next to the golden figurine. The leather of his gloves scraped against its smooth surface.

If _Byleth Eisner_ would decide to once more cleave the skies in two and step out of the void between the worlds to heed their teenage promise, then he would have something to interest her.

His throat tightened at the thought. This was different than the long, slow hours before dawn, with his head stuck between ledgers and old Church hagiographies, looking up the uneven stacks of books and recounting every single reason why his expectations were well-founded. She had made him a promise, five years and the war be damned, and he'd baked it into every single facet of his plans. Now came the time to collect.

If he'd been wrong all this time-

Nader had been worried about his obsession. Claude was beginning to understand why.

The dawn of the Millenium Festival had broken, and Byleth was nowhere to be found.

He forced down the fear with one hard swallow and drew a breath. Then, voice loud and casual, he called out:

“You’re late, Teach!”

The cathedral was still and silent before him, his voice echoing across the ruined walls.

Then a deep murmur reached him from under his feet. He looked down in alarm. It was as if the earth beneath the monastery was slowly humming under its breath.

Then it grew - and the altar vibrated with it.

Claude jumped off the altar in alarm. The tremor intensified in seconds -- and the earth _shook_ with it, tossing him against the rubble. He twisted midair to crash against it side-first. The entire monastery shook as if in fever, loose rubble falling over. Claude got to his feet, knees wobbly with adrenaline, and started running towards the bridge. Huma squealed above, her noises high and desperate, and dived down to snatch him -- 

There was a deafening _crack,_ and the ground under the cathedral split in half. 

A gaping chasm opened underneath, and the remaining walls of the ruin caved in an avalanche of rubble. Huma turned sharply mid-air to avoid a falling boulder. Claude tossed his bow away and ran towards her, arms straining to reach her claws amid the crumbling stones. 

A shadow loomed over him, and he had all of a split second to realise that a _column_ was falling over him. He swerved, jumping out of the way, but it was too slow --

Huma dived under the falling column and pushed him out. A piercing keen split the air. 

He flew like a rag doll, crashing hard against the stone, and the world blinked out into the darkness. 

With one more deafening crash, the haphazard foothold that held the bridge broke away from the mountain. Then -- slowly, torturously slowly, the earthquake stilled until the deep humming note died down. 

***

It took a long moment for his vision to return. Blinking furiously, and propping himself up on the raw edges of the debris around him, Claude slowly climbed to his feet. Something trickled alongside his face, hot and itching in the heavy dust. He took a wobbly step, wincing at the pain that shot up his knees.

He was not being attacked. And so -- the earthquake wasn't magic. It was not unthinkable that it would happen in this corner of Fódlan, even though there really had to be a god specially dedicated to Claude's misery to time it this well. But-- that was unimportant.

Huma’s wing had been crushed by the falling column. She keened softly underneath it, staring at him with her beady, intelligent eyes.

He bit back a curse and, swaying against the rubble, slowly limped toward her. “You--are a _fool,_ ” he said in a shaky voice, native vowels clipped in painful, urgent tenderness. “Let me-- don’t struggle now, good girl, you’ll hurt yourself _more_ \--”

He pushed up the cracked stone. Huma squealed, craning her neck to watch him; immobilised by shock, too pained to move.

 _Brute force, check,_ supplied his whirring, giddy mind. _Levars. Tools. Magic. Time magic - no, wait, that would be Byleth. Sword of the Creator. Still Byleth. Crest--_

He gritted his teeth and called on his blood. The electric current of Riegan flashed in the air. The dust around them shone emerald-green.

Bones in Huma’s wings scrunched and knitted together with a nauseating noise. She screamed, flapping both wings wildly in an attempt to get out. He pushed up the stone again and she crawled out, good wing vainly beating the air.

“A little too late to decide to abandon me now, don’t you think?” Claude said, swallowing thickly. “I wanna say you shouldn’t have, but then _I'd_ be the flattened one.” He limped closer to the wyvern and rested a hand on her stomach, trying to trickle into her whatever little he remembered from his faith lessons. 

Huma whimpered, her long, scaled snout nudging his shoulder. 

He leaned against her side and let out a shaky exhale. The dawn was rising over them, grey fading out into rosy gold of the morning.

One: the heavens really did hate him with unsubstantiated passion.

Two: they were well and truly trapped now, with no way out but down the chasm.

“Now… _that’s_ a fascinating question for a tactician,” he said airly, feeling the blood in his mouth slowly trickle down his throat. “One fallen bridge, one concussed duke, one grounded wyvern. How on earth do we get out?”

Only the wheezing sound of Huma's laboured breathing answered him, the dust settling in the eerily quiet cathedral.

_If they arrive, they’ll think I did not keep my promise._

_If she appears_ \--

His fingers closed on the chess piece.

 _This is_ _just more of managing losses. I'm great at that._

Then he pulled himself up.

“Let me investigate this place,” he told her, and Huma shifted weakly against him. Her shattered wing was limp and immobile against the rubble. “There’s gotta be a way out-- right? Rhea wasn't the kind of idiot who doesn't leave secret escape routes. All we gotta do now is dig them out. That's all. Literally unearthing secrets. I've been doing that long enough that the old noggin should work on instinct.” 

Propping himself up against the fallen stones, he slowly limped his way towards the centre of the cathedral. The crack that the _awfully timed_ earthquake had carved through the monastery ran across the length of the cathedral. Darkness gaped within it, and Claude averted his eyes. _Not down. Noted._

The stained glass of the rosette had shattered, and the sunlight that poured in through the cloud of dust was now a clear gold. Something glimmered within it, and he squinted and limped forward to see better.

The crack in the ground came to a head at the altar, split cleanly in half as if with a sword _._ Underneath, when the seam of the chasm began, bubbled over a _spring_ \-- a clear fount welling up from an underground river, bright in the sunrise. It spilt out into a wide puddle and bathed the cracked altar in pale golden light before disappearing back into the chasm. 

And in the shallow water lay a still silhouette. 

The view knocked the breath out of his lungs.

 _You’re late,_ he’d called --

 _Impossible,_ yelled the part of him that spent the most time haggling with the Roundtable. _Only to be expected,_ responded the one that had drafted all his draws with a single objective: make it to the moment when he meets her. _You have seen her cleave the sky before._

His giddy mind suddenly stood aflame, every thought firing up with blinding light. _Alleil. Myrddin. Merceus. Enbarr. Fódlan’s Locket. Defend the monastery first, rebuild - the cathedral is already in ruins, good. A new secular order. With her as an archbishop - no, her as the goddess -_

And then a tiny part of him just said, _Byleth._

He leapt forward, heedless of his injuries. Then he froze a step away: because that was _Byleth Eisner,_ her hair flowing like seaweed in the shallow puddle of the spring, unconscious but _alive_ and immaculate _,_ the exact face he had dug this very rubble for, had turned over every stone with terror to find, and then come away with a relief that he hadn’t; his queen on row one, column D, his _victory_.

_I was right._

Her right hand was clenched on something bright. Claude blinked, blinded by sunlight; but then he saw the gold edges, the copper-green hair.

His coin.

He sucked in a deep breath.

 _It’s not enough to just wish on it_. But he’d tossed it anyway.

“Hey,” he murmured with dry lips, stupid with joy and relief. “Hey, Teach.”

For the longest moment she was still. Then her eyes fluttered open, green and vast and endless. 

“You,” she said. She did not move to shield her eyes from the sun. Claude’s awestruck smile slowly dripped off his face. “Mortal. Who are you, and why do you disturb my slumber?”


	2. Unneeded

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Claude meets old friends.

_In the morning, waking up to terrible sunlight_

_All diffuse like skin abused, the sun is half its size_

_When you talk, you hardly even look in my eyes_

_In the morning, in the morning_

_The Shrine / An Argument,_ Fleet Foxes

The ruin was quiet. Only one ambient sound split the deafening silence: the sound of a sharp inhale.

His own, Claude realised, and his own only. Byleth’s chest did not move.

Her eyes, open wide and unblinking, were the colour of foaming waves. They were different than he had remembered.

He blinked and reached out to seize his Duke voice: calm, warm, and unflappable. “I’m hurt, Teach,” he said. “So it only takes five years to forget me? I’d have given it at least a decade.”

She didn’t answer. Only stared up at him with an unreadable, cold expression. He limped forward to block the sun shining directly into her eyes.

“Hey,” he said, voice going softer. “You’re doing the old break-the-essence-of-reality-to-come-back-to-us trick again, aren’t you? Too bad I’ve already seen it once before. You really gotta come up with a new strategy. Then again,” he added, offering a smile that pulled painfully at the tender back of his head, “you’re here now, so maybe it’s worth a little earthquake. Come on up now—“

She didn’t rise to meet his hand. When he bent with a groan to pull her up, she was cold and heavy like a boulder under his fingers – and just as immovable.

The skin beneath the pads of his gloves did not feel human.

Cold, foreboding dread crept up his throat. 

“Teach,” he repeated, letting go, “listen— you can’t just lounge in the water for the entire day, can you? We still have to meet with the others. Also, remember how you’ve always told me to pick up healing magic? I have a feeling you’re going to have a field day berating me once you see what happened to my wyvern. Though I have to say, I didn’t exactly expect that you would pull the entire cathedral down on us, when you finally decided to come back—”

“Who are you?” Byleth asked.

Claude exhaled, ignoring the ache constricting his chest. Then he extended his hand again. A ghostly emerald arch flashed over his fingertips; he could see it reflected, phantom-like, in Byleth’s still eyes. 

Only right, really; he should have thought of it himself. The face-walkers that had morphed into Tomas and Monica could still be among them, but they could not falsify his Crest. Prudent caution, that was it.

“Claude von Riegan,” he said. The Fódlani name rolled off his tongue without a hitch, smooth as a lie. “Remember that time you chased me out of the stables because I stuck a horn on Lorenz’s horse?”

“Riegan,” she repeated. Something in her eyes refocused.

His Crest shivered in the air, and he reflexively let go of it, a tight sensation pulling at the sides of his neck; but the emerald light did not stop spilling out of him. Instead it seemed to – unravel, somehow, and in the splintering prism he could see a whirlwind of flashing images –

Claude staggered away, pulse pounding in his ears. _A man drinks from a chalice. A bloody battle, green eyes alight with vengeance. A toddler tightens stubby fingers around the bones of a bow. We forgive you, says Saint Seiros, if you swear your fealty to—_

_You know, the crown prince says in a low, husky voice, there’s no coming back from this._

_Tiana von Riegan tosses her braid across her shoulder. Then, with a flicker of a dagger, she cuts it loose and hands it to him._

_She says: I want this more than I’m scared._

“That,” Claude said after a long moment of reigning in his frantic breath, pushing himself up against his knees, “was new.”

Byleth looked as if she was staring past him, beyond the eyes and skin into the cavities of his stomach. It took Claude a long moment to identify a strange emotion that welled itself up in his throat.

Something was – _different_.

He said, flatly, “You’re Sothis now, aren’t you?”

The woman that was not Byleth rose from the spring. The clear, sunlit water pooled at her feet, dripping off her hair and milk-white fingers. She was shorter than him, but Claude suddenly felt as small as a beetle pressed to the ground with an uncaring thumb.

“Yes,” she said, “but not more than you are Claude. Why did you wake me, child of Riegan?”

He swallowed, the metallic tang of blood suddenly overpowering in his mouth. “You’re wearing the body of someone I want to speak with. Can Byleth answer the door, please?”

“I am Byleth,” she said.

Claude drew a breath – and then exhaled. Priorities. “Listen, can we debate that in a moment? Teach or no Teach, I need your help. My wyvern—”

“No,” said the woman wearing Byleth’s face.

Claude turned to her incredulously. “What? Why not?”

“Walk away, child of Riegan,” she said. “No gods will fight your war for you.”

“I’m not asking you to fight any wars for the moment. My wyvern is wounded. And she wouldn’t be, had you not shaken the monastery so hard all of those fancy columns came crashing down. It’s your wound to heal, Sothis.”

Her face was utterly blank, unstirring at his casual blasphemy. “Is it?” she asked. “Or is it the fault of the rider who takes risks not for him to take, knowing that those who love him will protect him always? Your choices brought on her wound, child of Riegan. And your choices will determine if she ever flies again.”

Claude flinched.

The voice was Teach’s, and the blankness resembled the way she had spoken at the start of their year together: a flatly delivered rebuke. But the words were not Teach’s. They sounded of old, detached eloquence, of wisdom deprived of the weariness of experience.

In her, they were accompanied with nothing at all.

He ground a swear word in his teeth. “Will you really not help me now?”

The wet strands of her hair spilled an arch of clear drops as she slowly shook her head.

He stared at her, dawn-lit, and drew his lips tight. _One crisis at a time._ “Alright,” he said. “Hold that thought just a moment. There’s something I need to fix up first.”

*

The wyvern raised her head and keened softly at the sight of him limping towards her, claws scratching against the stone as she dragged her smashed wing up. There was hope for relief in her eyes, and Claude felt sick to his stomach at the thought.

“Hey,” he murmured, shuffling closer to lay a hand on her questing nose, “More pieces than we thought. Where was I? One grounded wyvern, one concussed duke, one goddess with ruffled feathers. And no Teach. Not for the moment, at least. What will we do, girl? Eh?”

Huma made a low, painful noise in the back of her scaled throat. Claude half-smiled at it. “That’s right. Not going anywhere unless we figure out how to heal you. Let’s see—”

The green Crest of Riegan shimmered through the air. Huma yelped at his touch. The airy bones of her batlike wing crunched horribly, dark blood pooling under the pierced leathery membrane. He stopped abruptly, and she balked from him, her healthy wing rising to put up a barrier.

“I’m trying to—” he protested, but then let go. _You can’t heal, von Riegan, congratulations, and how thorough that you deigned to prove it twice. Next idea._ He drew away and began to limp around the monastery, keeping a wide berth from the split altar and the goddess in front of it.

His search yielded him no luck. Beyond the ruined foundations of the cathedral there were only steep cliffs that no man, much less a swaying man, could hope to descend. The lights of the Abyss glimmered beneath, but he was too far up for them to hear, even if he yelled himself hoarse; and even if he did somehow reach them, it had been a long time since he had last heard from Yuri. There was no guarantee that if the Abyssians found a Sovereign Duke trapped with no escape route, they wouldn’t call straight for the Emperor.

Claude stepped away from the edge and considered again.

“Tunnels!” he said out loud, and winced at the maniacal sound that came out. The edges of his vision were blunting into soft brushes of an oil painting, the inevitable result of steady, unstemmed blood loss. “There’s gotta be tunnels out. Right? Just need to find that shaft to the Holy Tomb. Easy.”

The archway above the gates of the Holy Tomb had collapsed with the earthquake, crushing the entrance beneath a mound of rubble. Claude prodded one of the smaller stones, and then pulled it out; it broke free with an ominous clatter, the entire mound suddenly looming above him.

“Not easy,” he amended into the dusty silence.

It would be weeks before anyone noticed his absence. Less if a Roundtable vote tied without him, but that was unlikely: Judith would make decisions for them in all but the most extreme of cases. Nader would take his extended vacation as a good thing. Servants would barely notice he was no longer there; he had already cultivated an aura of a paranoiac with outlandish habits, who would not let maids into his office and insisted on grabbing his own breakfast straight from the palace kitchens. Now there was a thought: maybe the cook would make noise.

Yes – a cook would miss him.

He was going to starve here, and watch Huma die in front of him.

His pulse pounding in his ears, Claude stared into the wall of rubble. He could feel the thick, sticky clotting slowly expand down the side of his neck. He needed to focus before the blood loss made him even more of a fool. He needed—

“Teach,” he heard his mouth call, old reflexes kicking in.

It had once been second nature. _Cut your losses, find the nearest healer,_ Byleth had said in her flat tone; they had gone through that pre-fight drill countless times. _If there isn’t a healer around, find me._

 _What if you’re not around?_ he’d piped up, less a query and more a break from the devastating boredom of the drill. Byleth had regarded him with an unimpressed glance.

 _I’ll be there,_ she’d said, and he’d clung to that for five years.

Half-blind, he groped his way through the rubble, tripping on his own feet, listening for the shimmer of the stream. She was there, still and inhuman, just as he had left her; and Claude staggered toward her with outstretched arms.

“Teach,” he called, his tongue unnaturally stiff in his mouth. “If you’re in there— I’d really, really like to see you now.” When she didn’t move, he leaned against the shattered remains of a column and slowly slid down. “You’re alive, and I was right. I waited, all that time, for just the smallest chance, and I was right. Don’t you know this changes—“

A shadow moved beyond his field of vision. The sun hit him unobstructed, glowing red through his shut eyelids.

“— everything ?”

“Leave me, mortal,” said the flat voice of Byleth. “I bring you no aid.”

Something hot trickled down his cheeks.

_Blood. I’m losing blood._

Then he blindly forced his legs to carry him up and away, refusing to look until he stumbled into the shadow. The world was swimming around him, the rubble fading into swatches of dusty grey. _This changes nothing,_ said a voice in his head, and Claude seized on it with mindless obstinacy. _This is just one more stalemate. You lose nothing._

His chest ached. The earthquake had thrown him against the wall, after all; it was only natural to start feeling it eventually.

 _Hope_ , said another voice. _That’s what you’re losing. Stalemate._

 _Big word,_ Claude thought and forced a grin. This was only a change of plans. A challenge. It would take longer, and would be more complicated, but a solution would eventually reveal itself through a maze of endless possible failures. He could be a patient man; had to be, to have wormed his way out of so many of them.

 _Hopeless_ , said the voice. It had the cultured inflection of Gellert Gloucester. _You – are hopeless._

The shock of the realisation sharpened his senses. Claude blinked rapidly and suddenly found himself at the verge of the chasm, the fallen bridge unseen from the heights. Darkness gaped within, beckoning. A step away. Had it not been for Huma, it would have already claimed him.

Claude stared down. The edges of the chasm undulated gently, river-like.

A cook would miss him. His nation – only after a while.

Through a thick white noise in his ears, an insistent sound made itself known. Louder and louder, until it became impossible to tune it out. He raised his eyes to see a dark shape approaching, its leathery wings beating a familiar rhythm.

“Huma?” he called, suddenly light-headed. He wobbled unsteadily and reached out—

“ _Hilda_ ,” the shape said indignantly – and then shrieked as Claude fell forward.

*

“What do you mean she’s not herself?” demanded Lysithea. Claude winced. Marianne, still pressing a blue-coated hand to either side of his head, sent her a disapproving glance.

The Golden Deer had gathered at the fallen gates of the monastery. Their hastily set camp overlooked the ruined courtyard; the earthquake had felled several of their tents, which now sprawled across the rubble like bedsheets blown from the line. Through the flap of the remaining one, bright mid-afternoon light came piercing in. Claude was half-lying inside, propped upon one elbow and offering the other for the inspection of his pulse; his old classmates were crowding around him.

They had come to honour their promise, all of them. In any other circumstances, Claude would have found it heartening; but now the dull, empty feeling in his chest threatened to swallow all else.

Outside, a large wyvern with a Goneril collar was circling Huma, emitting subdued, worried reptilian screeches.

“I _mean_ ,” he said, pitching up his voice to match Lysithea’s shrill tone, “remember when we were wondering what changed back at the Academy, when she stepped through the sky? The worst-case scenario we were considering back then? That happened.”

Lysithea’s complexion was rapidly turning into an unhealthy shade of violet. “So she was pretending to be Professor—“

“No,” Claude said. “She said she wasn’t her anymore. Apparently, she’s the Goddess now.”

Marianne’s palms shivered against his temples. “Are you... certain, Claude?”

He bit back a snappy retort and nodded. Silence fell in the purple Gloucester tent.

“And she won’t help us,” Ignatz said, his voice laden with thinly veiled despair. He had grown into his armour, Claude observed dispassionately, and lost most of his childish naiveté; but clearly not all. “The Goddess. She’s there, in the cathedral, and she won’t help us.”

“Surely you have gravely misread the situation, Claude,” said Lorenz. He’d been pacing restlessly from the moment Claude had opened his eyes. “Or is it another one of those schemes of yours? One targeting our very faith? If so, then you shan’t continue a second longer!”

“He’s not lying,” Leonie said, ducking down to enter the tent with a can of hot soup. She had changed little; only her eyes grew more restless, as if uncertain what to focus on next. That was what losing a mentor did to people, Claude supposed. He knew those eyes from the mirror. “That’s not his lying voice.”

“As if you’d know his lying voice,” said Lorenz, scoffing.

“He’s got a point,” said Claude.

“You shut up,” Leonie growled, pushing the hot can into his lap. “You were supposed to protect her, not— whatever happened!”

The staggering injustice of that accusation made him recoil. “And what do you suggest I should’ve done, Leonie? Annoy the literal divine being into giving Teach back?”

“You could annoy anyone into combustion,” muttered Lorenz.

Leonie stared at him for a long moment, then put her hand over her eyes. “I— ugh! I’m sorry! I’m just— I promised Captain Jeralt I would be there for her, and— she stays dead for five years, and the second we get her back, she’s not even herself?!”

To Claude’s terror, Marianne’s lip began to tremble. “So... we have no Professor?” she asked in a quiet voice. “And no Goddess?”

The flap of the tent shuddered as sudden force pushed it open. “Are you crying, Marianne?” demanded Raphael, eyes very close to panicked.

“Raphael, if you’re here, who’s standing guard?” asked Lorenz sharply.

“I dunno— but you guys can’t make Marianne cry!”

“Oh, _please_ ,” said Hilda very loudly. “You barge in here—”

“This is beneath the dignity of our post—” said Lorenz over her.

“You’re missing the _point—_ “ said Lysithea, words immediately drowning in chaos.

Claude closed his eyes. Despair pushed down on him, threatening to choke. _And what is the point of it? We were just rowdy kids without her. And now we’re rowdy adults._

Then he opened his eyes and said very loudly, “Can I have a spoon?”

The tent fell silent. He felt the weight of seven pairs of eyes on him, momentarily more baffled than annoyed.

“ _What_ ,” said Lorenz.

“A spoon,” Claude repeated, patiently. “I’ve got this soup right here—” he brandished the beaten metal can, “—and I’ve been told on numerous occasions that it’s beneath my station to just _drink it_ from a _dish_ like an _animal_ , especially in the company of four Roundtable heirs. So, I had this wild idea: I could perhaps request a utensil. What is your esteemed opinion?”

In the confounded silence, Leonie offered him a tin spoon she had clutched in her fist. Claude gave her his best ducal bow and lifted the lid.

“ _Mmmph_. So good,” he made out around a spoonful, relishing the way Lorenz’s entire face twitched convulsively. “You’re still great at this, Leonie. You should all have some.”

“Is he still concussed, or have we just not seen each other for a while?” Lysithea asked nobody in particular.

Claude winked at her. “Just your old pal Claude. Sit down and have some with me, won’t ya?”

“Surely this was just the broth for the ailing—” began Lorenz.

“I made enough for everyone,” said Leonie.

Soon they were sitting cross-legged on the damp ground, sharing scratched dishes and disfigured mugs that had been whipped out once Leonie ran out of plates. Inhaling his share of soup – thick, brown, and savoury, with generous chunks of what had to be deer meat floating amid little pools of glistening oil – Claude contemplated the quiet, half-awkward feeling of sharing a meal with friends turned strangers. They were all different than he’d seen them last, grown and twisted in unfamiliar ways.

Raphael had grown broader, a tanned and ruddy face growing out of shoulders large enough to embrace three; and from what little intelligence Claude had put together on him over the last five years, that humongous chest hid a heart to match: regardless of how meagre, two-thirds of his paycheck would unerringly find its way to the Kirsten homestead ledgers. His letters arrived intermittently, never longer than a page, and never with a single complaint.

Lysithea, though he had hardly thought it possible, had grown thinner. Her skin was almost translucent, with bird-like wrists and a sickly concave waist, slim enough he could very well expect to break it with one hand. The tenacity that she’d always held seemed to sap the strength of her body, leaving only her eyes burning in a sunken, childish face. She had thrown herself into domestic affairs at the border, leaving her mother to tend to the Roundtable; Claude had seen precious little of her through the last five years, and she looked worse each time.

Ignatz's change had been perhaps the starkest. He had grown taller, the childish blubber falling away from his face to reveal sharp, unforgiving angles of adulthood. The war had taken his agonising choice away from him, narrowing it to either _soldier_ or _dead weight -_ so a soldier he had been; and, judging by the heavy sword callouses against Claude's temple, so was Marianne. This wasn't a time for gentleness.

Meanwhile, Lorenz - Lorenz had grown pale, stressed, and sour. Claude would sympathise more, if the Gloucesters' continuous insistence on throwing obstacles his way had not cost him a good chunk of his own colour. 

Through stilted conversation, the subject of Byleth and the war hung over them with a wide shadow; he could see it in the darting glances and awkward pauses. But they all heeded his tacit command to lock it away for a meal. Perhaps they all had grown, if only a smidgeon. 

“You should run a restaurant, Leonie!” Raphael said. “Boy, I really missed your food!”

“I missed you too, Raph,” said Leonie with a minor eyeroll.

“Hilda, you’re on dish duty,” said Claude. Immediately a set of vividly pink nails dug into his shoulder.

“You’re cute,” Hilda said. “You think just because you used to be the house leader—”

“Lady Goneril, the Roundtable commands you to do the dish duty,” Claude amended without a blink – and was surprised by the sudden silence. Hilda’s face turned still for a split second, eyes darting down. He opened his mouth, suddenly flush with shame.

“You’re the worst,” Hilda exclaimed loudly and drew away, making a show of gathering the dishes as slowly as humanly possible. Claude gave a fake grin, mind whirring – but there was little time as the remaining pairs of eyes centred on him.

_Your rebuttal, Lord Riegan?_

“Look,” he began slowly. “I’m going to break a habit here and actually be honest with you.” That earned him a quiet snort from Lorenz in an otherwise silent tent. “I’ve been hoping for a different sort of reunion. You know, something a little bit more... hope-worthy. I always knew we haven’t heard the end of Teach just yet, and her turning out to be something— different is hard to swallow. ” He nodded at Marianne and Ignatz. “But here’s the thing. My retainer has been telling me for years that she would never come back. That it was just a fool’s errand. And this particular fool,” he said, pointing a half-mocking thumb at his own chest, “decided to run after her anyway. And guess what? I didn’t find her. I failed. But I did find something else. Something that can still help us win this war.”

Silence rang in his ears as he held the pause, expectant. Finally, after an eternity, Lysithea was the one to ask, “What?”

“You,” he said.

His former classmates looked at each other, and Claude clenched his fists tight, suddenly desperately wanting to trust his own words. Hope was the worst of habits. “And that’s _enough_.”

“But,” Marianne said quietly, “without the Professor… how?”

“I don’t know yet,” he said, voice catching ever so slightly in his throat. “But whatever it is, I will find out. And even if it’s not for a while yet, isn’t that what Teach would have wanted? The Golden Deer has gathered here, just as we promised. And between the eight of us, the mighty house, the winners of the Battle of Eagle and Lion, have we ever failed?”

“Yes,” Lorenz said, voice clipped. “The Holy Tomb.”

Claude waved away his obstinacy. “Have we ever failed whilst not facing a surprise attack of the entire Imperial Army?”

“But that’s the crux of the matter, is it not?” Lorenz said tightly, drawing himself up to face Claude. “That’s what you want us to do. I only came here because I wished to watch it with my own eyes. You would have us create some manner of— of a collective of revolutionaries, stepping against the Empire, endangering the entire Alliance! Even you must realise the folly of this.”

“I do,” Claude said. “I promise you I do. And I don’t believe you’re only here to report back to your father. You want this, Lorenz, and you’re just as sick of this game of cat and mouse as I am. You can see what's coming.” Ignoring Lorenz’s scandalised look, he turned to face the rest of the Deer. “Edelgard won’t stop until we are all her subjects. Believe me, I know that kind of determination. And there will be no Alliance with her on the throne. As we speak, our forces are engaged in defensive battle along the Ordelia border—”

“Oh, for Goddess’s sake, _shut up_ ,” Lysithea said, with feeling. “Those long-winded speeches are the one thing I did not miss about you! The Empire is evil. We all know we don't want them swallowing the Alliance. We need to stop them, and stop them now. Professor or no Professor, I stand with you.”

“I’m with you too,” Leonie said. “My village— we’re Alliance. We want to stay Alliance. If I can fight to keep it, I will.”

“The Goddess drew us here for a reason,” said Ignatz softly, looking at Marianne. “ If you say that we can-- we can stop this war, and do it in her name, then-- I believe you, Claude. That’s why I came.”

“This is what the Professor would have wanted,” Marianne said very quietly.

Claude swallowed thickly, something hot pressing against his chest. He thought of the coins tossed into the water, of unfounded hope, and smiled against the knot in his throat.

Lorenz looked at him. His eyes, naturally narrow, were little more than purple-tinged slits. “There was a reason _you_ have avoided conflict for five years. You know we cannot win.”

“Sure,” Claude said, feeling slightly queasy at the enormity of the bald-faced flattery he was about to offer. He reached into his belt pouch and scattered its contents into the fabric-laden floor of the tent. Out rolled a collection of metal chess pieces; he picked out a knight and handed it to Lorenz with an earnest expression. “Not without you.”

Lorenz stared. His cheeks took on a pink tinge.

Behind him, Hilda gave Claude a bemused look.

“We can do this,” Claude said. “We can change the course of this war. But only together.”

Lorenz’s throat worked as he took the piece and examined it. The golden ridges of the knight’s mane glistened under his fingers. “Very well,” he said slowly, solemnly. “I shall— work with you. For the good of the Alliance.”

 _Or your own vanity,_ Claude thought as he clapped Lorenz’s shoulder. _No matter. An end is an end._

“My front guard,” he said, offering golden pawns to Raphael, Ignatz, and Leonie. “My far-reaching mages,” and both Marianna and Lysithea accepted their bishops. “My pillar of defence,” and Hilda stepped forward to snatch a rook from between his fingers. “Together we have the power to build the kind of world we want to live in. And we will build it!”

Raphael whooped. Marianne smiled. Lorenz gave a stiff nod.

“ _Speeches_ ,” said Lysithea, distastedly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to Iris_the_Messenger, liripip, and verdantstars for their feedback on this, especially as I was throwing wild amounts of words at them in exhaustion-induced mania. You guys _rock_ , and it's only through your love and indulgence that I managed to get myself out of that barren wasteland that had been my creative mindset as of late.
> 
> Next chapter will drop sooner than in three months, I promise ;_; watch this space. And drop a comment to tell me what you think!


	3. The Fall

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Housekeeping note! This might seem a bit familiar - it's because I took my beta amiah's good advice, split the previous chapter into two, and rewrote the second half significantly. Apologies for a bit of a cop-out of an update - hopefully, with more than 4k of new content, it'll be enough to keep you sated until Chapter 4 (which I am currently toiling away at, so, _soon..._ )

_Sunlight over me no matter what I do_

_Apples in the summer are golden sweet_

_Every day a passing complete_

_The Shrine / An Argument,_ Fleet Foxes

They took to work enthusiastically, clearing the rubble from the courtyard to open up a wide path towards the entrance hall. The earthquake worsened what had already been a dilapidated state of the stronghold, but its foundation still held. For once it was as Claude had hoped: most of the buildings on the periphery, outside of the immediate invading path of the Imperial army - stables, barracks, staff quarters, even the miraculously-untrampled memorial garden - had avoided major damage and could be used still. Rolling away the uneven boulders that barricaded the courtyard archways, he imagined the monastery rise again, dripping with Leicester gold: a new, secular order hosted within. An obvious point of focus for all allies disliking the new Emperor’s pragmatic bloodshed. 

It could be their home once more. New beginnings, without a goddess to cast a shadow. 

He squashed any thought of Byleth. They could enter the cathedral once every other area of the monastery was rebuilt. She could stay there, alone and aloof, while they won the war with their own strength. Perhaps Nader had been right after all; his youthful obsession had blinded him to the truth. 

No saviour would arrive, and they would win all the same. He only needed a moment to rethink.

“Careful,” Raphael said good-naturedly, extending his log of an arm to stop an avalanche of rubble from tumbling on Claude’s shoulders. Claude looked up, blinked, and took a step back as Raphael gently removed the largest shards of smashed limestone from the top of the pile. On the far end of the fallen cloister, Marianne and Lysithea were inspecting one student room after another, black flames efficiently devouring mouldy woollen blankets and woodworm-infested furniture. 

An inscription caught his eye. On the side of the smashed limestone, half-obscured by the spidering white cracks, a haphazard drawing revealed what could be an X or could also be crossed swords. Beneath it was a chicken scratch dug by a long-gone hand: 

_JvD_

_TvR_

Claude’s lip twitched as he brushed the letters with a gloved thumb. Not just his own memories lived within these walls; not just his own past pulled at him. Garreg Mach was a potent symbol for all of Fódlan, and reclaiming it would naturally elevate them to a position of high authority. What Garreg Mach decreed, the continent enacted, and where Garreg Mach stood became a position of righteousness. 

He was drawn out of his reverie by another mighty clatter, followed by a flying cloud of dust. “Uh. Sorry about that. You okay, Claude?”

“Never better,” Claude said, opening his arms wide to show off his new chalk-white colouring. “Why, do I look a little pale?”

Raphael gave a bark of laughter at his wink. But Claude’s focus was suddenly drawn to the ground, where the wet, trampled turf was slowly bending down under the newly shifted rocks.

Claude leapt forward, pushing Raphael out of the way, his face crashing against the man’s chest like he’d headbutted a brick wall. Raphael windmilled his arms wildly, taking a precarious step back, and tripping on the rubble; they fell backward as the sod crumbled away under their feet, a damp sinkhole opening up in the grass.

“What on--!” cried Lysithea from the other side of the courtyard.

“Found my tunnels,” Claude muttered to himself as he scrambled to his feet, offering Raphael a hand up. “Sorry, buddy. We might need to tread lightly around here. I wonder what’s in there?”

“ _Oh,”_ Raphael said, instead of rising. Claude followed his gaze down. From the hole in the cellar wafted the smells of a sprawling pantry: smoked venison strung among the braids of garlics, wreaths of dried mushrooms and herbs, painted wheels of blue-veined cheese, meticulously tightened jars of pickles and sweet preserves. They must have broken through to the dining hall supplies. No-one would have touched them after the attack, and Garreg Mach cooks knew how to preserve their ingredients.

Claude grinned so hard the still-tender back of his head hurt. _Finally, a good surprise._ Raphael’s face was currently growing to be more smile than man. “You know what that means, eh, Raphael?”

“ _F_ _east!_ ” the man exclaimed, loud enough for the ravens atop the cloister to startle to flight, and Claude cackled with it. A base, an authority, a means to feed his men, and wine to celebrate; he'd done more with far less.

"Thanks, Garreg Mach," he murmured, patting the engraved granite.

* 

At late noon, an unerring impression of a hawk’s cry sounded through the air.

Claude made a curt gesture, and Raphael, Marianne, and Lysithea crept silently after him to the monastery gates. Ignatz waited for them there, back pressed against the side of the fallen gateway, his bow drawn and readied. They moved forward, taking place on either side of the gates. Claude pressed his fingers through the rotten plank, punching out a peephole. 

A dozen soldiers were approaching the monastery from the townsway, face covered with grey shawls. They bore the silver insignia of the Church of Seiros. 

Claude kept still, listening for the clattering footfalls. It was not the Empire, but it wasn’t in itself a sign of no danger. The Church was never an enemy, but neither were they an ally; after Oswald von Riegan’s refusal to come to their aid against Edelgard's crusade, the Knights had retreated to the Kingdom, and then promptly disappeared at its fall. For all Claude’s attempts to seek them out after, they had been elusive for four years, ignoring envoys and evading infiltration with remarkable agility. 

The soldier leading the battalion spoke, and the group rearranged itself into a wedge. The soldier at the head of the wedge passed the threshold of the gate. His head whirled nervously; Claude locked eyes with Lysithea.

“Let them know we’re here,” he whispered, angling a thumb up.

Lysithea gave a sharp nod and opened her purple glove. A plume of fire rose from her palm, draping itself over the shattered gateway in both announcement and warning. 

The soldiers froze in their formation. Their weapons flew up. “Identify yourself,” called the leader of the wedge. “In the name of Seiros! Who dwells there, friend or foe?”

“That,” Claude said, stepping in the middle of the gate with a bow held loosely in his right hand, “is entirely up to you to decide.”

The soldier stilled. Claude watched him note the bow, add the golden garb to the dark complexion, arrive at the inevitable conclusion, and falter before the responsibility of determining the Knights’ relationship with the Leicester Alliance. Not through any fault of his own, there was only one move for a pawn: forward.

“Duke Riegan,” said the soldier and gave a half-respectable nod without lowering his lance. “I will relay your message to my commander, if you have one.”

Claude returned the nod. At the corner of his eye, he noted a shadow passing behind him, but kept his expression smooth. “Thank you, good sir. My message is that your epistolary habits are abysmal. Would it hurt Lord Seteth to return my letters?”

The soldiers’ eyes darted behind him before he was done speaking. Claude pulled his mouth into a smile.

“You’re dead,” said a voice in his ear.

He went still.

With an unmissable soft _snick_ of ripped fabric, the knife between his shoulder blades moved down to target his heart. Too close to dodge; the second he tried to wriggle away or give an order, he would be skewered. He was cornered, with no move left. On both sides of the gateway, he could see the Deer make the same calculation.

Tone light, he said, “Hello, Shamir.”

“I’ll only ask this once,” she said into his ear, voice calm and perfectly cold. “So keep your shiny words to yourself. Did you or did you not have anything to do with Lady Rhea’s kidnapping?”

“No,” Claude said. The knife pressed tighter against his skin.

“Are you an ally of the Emperor?”

“If I were,” Claude said with the lightness he did not feel, “don’t you think our northern flank would be quite a bit more peaceful?” 

The tip of the knife droved into his back, and Claude bit back a yelp. “Don’t play coy with me, golden boy. The Leicester neutrality cost us dearly already.”

“I won’t fight a war I cannot win,” Claude said. The graze bled into the fabric of his coat, spreading a splotch of warmth across his back. That decision had been his grandfather’s, and if he'd been allowed to keep his own counsel, he would have perhaps done it differently; but the consequences were his to own regardless. “I won’t apologise for that. But I am seeing a new path ahead, and I would be very sorry if the past stops you from walking it with me.”

He blinked, steeling himself for the white-hot pain of a knife slipping between his ribs, and turned around.

The woman looking at him was still, uncaring, but even the most crafty of poker faces could not completely obscure the near-emaciated thinness that poked her cheekbones through her skin; nor the exhaustion bearing heavy under her dark, impassive eyes. It had been five years since they’d scattered and fled. Long enough even for mercenaries to grow weary.

“You don’t want to kill me,” Claude said, certain against the wild beating of his defenceless heart. “Does that mean we’re allies?”

Shamir’s lip twitched. “Your standards are abysmally low.”

“Hey,” Claude said, winking, “I’m a friendly sort of guy. Truce, then?”

Shamir nodded slowly and lowered the knife. The lances of the battalion went down with it. At Claude’s side, Lysithea let go of the miasma in her hands, and Ignatz loosened his bowstring.

Claude stepped away and turned around, hiding a shaky exhale. He made a sweeping, welcoming gesture toward the dilapidated ruin behind him. “Care to join us for a meal?”

*

The Knights of Seiros poured into Garreg Mach little by little. They had all been made fugitives after the fall of the Kingdom, and certainly looked it; there were more of them than he had expected, a testament to both Shamir’s elusive tactics and Claude’s own failure to keep efficient tabs on the potential ally in the fog of war. Four of the former Knights led the way, all familiar since their Academy assignments: Alois, Catherine, Shamir, and Seteth, the last man clearly holding command. They restated the truce, and Claude gregariously invited the bulk of the army into the monastery, noting the spark of irritation in Seteth's eyes at his blithe host-playing. It was unearned, certainly, but Claude had no intention of relinquishing his finders-keepers right. Garreg Mach would stay secular if he had something to say about it.

Before nightfall, the monastery began to shine with the light of dozens of bonfires, familiar chatter returning to the halls. Not all of them looked as thin as Shamir, but the soldiers’ eyes brightened when Raphael and Leonie began distributing hearty stew generously sprinkled with the pantry herbs. Claude did not miss the way they stared up, drinking in the walls and watchtowers. However well-kept their armour was, these were troops on the run, long-deprived of stable quarters. They would fight hard to preserve their home.

“Hey, gal,” called out a familiar booming voice. Leonie froze, then turned around with a nascent grin. Alois, greyer at the temple, but no less boisterous than in Claude’s Academy memories, opened his arms in a greeting. “I’ve been hearing about you. You’re doing the old man proud!”

Leonie pinked over her ladle. Claude grinned, clapping her in the back before slinking out of sight to watch the troops slowly moving in. 

With the stroke of eight, darkness fallen on the Millenium Festival, the Golden Deer and the old staff of the Academy gathered around the fractured table. A web of cracks broke the emblazoned map of Fódlan into splintered pieces. The clatter of the armoured boots reached them through the glassless war room windows, the whole of the army having now marched inside, save for a small front guard left in the city. 

Claude took the seat opposite Seteth, scanning the man’s face for clues. 

At either side, both Catherine and Shamir looked worn and thin, shadows bearing heavy under their eyes; but Seteth himself was as inscrutable as ever, smooth-faced and dignified as if neither the war nor time had touched him. Claude had never taken much interest in the man, mainly because in comparison to Rhea, her advisor was, frankly speaking, not very interesting. Every school was in need of a disciplinarian, and Seteth had seemed pleased enough to fill the role whilst not busy burning records and censoring Church archives. That, too, was not surprising - it was a similar set of competencies, half meticulous bureaucracy and half discipline enforcement. Claude had no doubt that if there was anyone responsible for keeping Leicester spies off the Knights’ tail, it would be Seteth himself.

But, as skilled as he could have been with information control, Claude did not expect the prim, fussy advisor to be as well put-together leading a rebel faction as he had been policing student bedtime. 

One more enigma to unravel. _You are used to war, eh, Lord Seteth?_

“We were certain that if she were alive and able to do so, Lady Rhea would return here for the Millennium Festival,” Seteth said, looking around the table. “If she were not here, then it would prove beyond all doubt that she is not simply lost – and so our continued travels would have no purpose. Now that this has proven true, we must now rise to strike the false Emperor in her name, either to reclaim or avenge her. That is the current objective of the Knights of Seiros.”

Therein lay a host of problems Claude could pick on, not least of them the fact that they were clearly less concerned about the rise of invading tyranny than one woman’s life; but he could save his doubts for after they’ve struck an agreement. It was far from certain still. “How many soldiers, now that you’ve gathered?”

“Six thousand men,” said Catherine, and Alois nodded proudly. Leonie let out a low whistle.

“What she said,” Claude said. The Goneril battalions counted only a little over that, the biggest army in the Alliance; and Holst would never offer his entire force for the front lines, not with the threat to his east. In his mind, the war map began to reorganise itself with giddy speed. “And you managed to keep that huge group operating undercover all that time? Wow, I am just itching to see your ledgers—“

“What Lord Riegan means to say,” Lorenz said, casting him a devastating look, “is that we hold the Seirosian tenets dear to our hearts, and there is no task more hallowed than reclaiming Lady Rhea.”

“We could only hope to be worthy of it,” Claude amended smoothly. “It is decided, then. Since we appear to share our goals, the Knights of Seiros and the Leicester Alliance will form a coalition against the Empire.”

Seteth gave him a cool, calculating glance. “We have made that offer once before. Do you have the authority to speak for the Leicester Alliance?”

Lorenz opened his mouth. Claude drove a heeled boot into his foot.

“Don’t think we don’t appreciate it,” Catherine said. “The Church needs allies to win this war. And had we allied from the beginning, this situation would have been very different. But this will be the end of Leicester neutrality. Do you get to decide these things outside of the Roundtable?”

Claude nodded solemnly, ignoring Lorenz squirming in his seat. “That we do. But take a look around. A Riegan, a Gloucester, a Goneril, an Edmund, and an Ordelia all throwing their lot behind your cause. Are you a gambling woman, Catherine?”

Catherine and Alois exchanged glances. “I’ve been known to win a bet or two,” Catherine said.

“Then I’m sure you can see the favourable odds,” Claude said, allowing a hint of an earnest smile to brighten his serious expression. “On my honour as a Riegan, I can guarantee the Alliance will stand together on this. ”

The Knights of Seiros looked to Seteth. He held Claude’s eyes for a moment, the air between them feeling as cracked as the table spreading beneath their folded hands.

"Your grandfather refused us," he said. "He chose to equal our defensive action with the Empire's blasphemous invasion to preserve peace within his own nation. Is that the Riegan honour you swear on, Your Lordship?"

"My grandfather," said Claude, "refused to be drawn into a war of annihilation. You recall that the first attack brought down Garreg Mach itself. How do you imagine it would go down if the demonic beasts started marching across the Airmid? With no time to prepare, no time to dispatch troops even, we would have drowned the entire Alliance in blood and got nothing for it. My grandfather would not fight an unwinnable war, and nor will I. However--"

"Every war is unwinnable for a man that will not fight," said Seteth, a scholarly inflection at odds with the sharpness of his eye. "Meanwhile, others will bleed for him."

"However," Claude said, employing his well-practiced Roundtable trick to regain the smooth impetus as if he had not been interrupted, "this war is no longer unwinnable. The Empire's resources are dwindling. The fall of the Kingdom could have been a success, but now that they no longer face a single enemy, their fronts are stretched from Teutates to Bleiddyd. They've been stationed far away from their strongholds, with tired troops and precarious supply chains. Most importantly, we are no longer surprised." He leaned forward with a glint in his eye. "I've been preparing for this moment for a long time. You'd know that, if you ever read my letters."

"I have," Seteth said. 

A brief silence overtook the table. Shamir's face was blank, but both Catherine and Alois were looking at Claude with a barely restrained sense of longing. Seteth was a skilled commander, Claude thought with some muted respect, and strangely at ease with war; but he lacked the passion that divided commanders from leaders. An advisor more than just in role, he'd been ill at ease as the standard-bearer of his movement. Given opportunity, or a little push, he would reclaim his old position with relief. 

"Then you know that it was never my intention to be your enemy," he said, "or to watch your people suffer. I know very well that after Edelgard is done with the Kingdom, we'll be next on her list. But unlike you, Lord Seteth, I'm a pragmatic man, and I don't really want to be a martyr. I won't fight unless there's a way for me to win. And I'm not really seeing it without allying with the mighty Knights of Seiros. So, if we cannot stand together, I suppose it's back to the drawing board for me." Let him be responsible for the bemoaned Leicester neutrality, if he chose to cling to past grievances. Claude drew on a dismissive smile instead. "I've managed not to give her a pretext so far, I'm sure I can manage some time more."

"Master Tactician, was it?" Seteth said.

"I just like thinking things through," Claude said with a minor shrug. "If you think that's some sort of mastery, then yeah, sure."

Seteth drew his lips tight. He looked forward for a long silent moment, eyes narrowing in focus, as if reaching through the air for some unseen insight. Weighing Oswald's refusal and Claude's subsequent balancing act against his own stark need for allies, undoubtedly; but Claude did not need the man to trust him overmuch yet. Just enough to confirm the validity of their common motive would be enough, for the moment.

Then Seteth nodded.

“Very well, Claude von Riegan,” he said. “We can agree that our odds of victory increase if we stand together. As it was at the conception of the Leicester Alliance, so be it again. The Church stands with you. Shall we discuss our objectives?”

Claude nodded, extending his arm to catch Seteth’s in a tight, military grip. The man squeezed back, completing the gambit, and some of the tension in Claude’s temples receded.

Even without Byleth, the first piece had fallen into place. She was irrelevant, in the grand scheme of things. His plan would adjust, and so would the Roundtable.

To his side, Lorenz’s eyes bored holes in his head.

* 

The evening stretched long and dark at the war table, immediately reminiscent of the endless Roundtable debates. At the corner of his eye, he could see Raphael snoozing in his chair, his broad frame twisted uncomfortably. The Knights were also stifling yawns - save for Seteth, who still held himself ramrod-straight, heedless of the creeping time.

Finally, Claude leaned back in the chair with an acquiescing nod. “Thanks, all of you. These numbers are looking mighty promising. Though there is one other matter you must know - something concerning our old Teach.”

“Professor Eisner?” Seteth asked, eyes flashing. Claude almost startled back, filing the sudden reaction for later.

Under _promising_. 

Before he opened his mouth, a grey-clad child poked his head into the war room. “Excuse me,” said Shamir, standing up with an audible creak of bones. “You’ll catch me up later, Catherine, eh?”

“Will do,” Catherine said, stifling a yawn in a cuff of her sleeve. Seteth gave a perfunctory nod, eyes never leaving Claude’s.

“I’m listening,” he said. “What of the Professor?”

Claude restrained a bitter smile. As he spoke, the room fell more and more silent. 

Word by word, he watched Seteth’s mask peel off; and it was a perverse sort of satisfaction to watch his own shock reflected so viscerally on another’s face. Claude leaned forward, voraciously curious.

“That— that cannot be,” Seteth stammered finally. His old librarian façade shuddered - and then fell off completely. The calm, inscrutable man of letters was suddenly gone, replaced at once by someone barely holding on to his senses. “The Goddess— the Goddess here?! Why didn’t you lead with that, fool?!”

 _Because you would have run off without giving me the rundown of your troops._ "My apologies," Claude said. "I didn't think it would have been so important."

Seteth gave him a wild, unhearing glance - and then shoved his chair away from the table. “Excuse me. I will-- _oh, Seiros_ \-- ”

“What the hell, Riegan?!” demanded Catherine, banging her fist against the table. “Don’t you think that the Goddess dwelling in the monastery would be-- _important_?!”

“Surely that’s a figure of speech,” said Alois, unsteadily. “Surely that’s not our goddess.”

“You ‘re welcome to check yourselves,” Claude said. Lip curling darkly, he added, "If you’re willing to break your own hearts. You'll see what I mean soon enough."

Seteth bridled wildly at that - and then stormed out of the room without another word. His frantic steps echoed down the stairway.

“We must-- shall we go with him?” stammered Alois. Catherine gave a curt nod, and then both of them hurried out, almost knocking Shamir off her feet.

Claude and Shamir locked eyes.

A tense silence stretched between them. Claude thought about the battalions left at the ruined Garreg Mach Town, and about the precious few things he knew about the movements of the Imperial troops on this side of Oghma. This had been inevitable, but at least this time he had gained allies first.

“A goddess, huh?” said Shamir, tone flat. “I’d like to see that. But here’s the thing, golden boy. Since we got here for the Millennium Festival, and she did too, and so did all of you... There might be someone coming for a reunion.”

Claude drew a breath. 

“Leonie, Seteth likes you, doesn’t he?” he said.

Leonie blinked, startled. “I guess? We used to fish together.”

“Great,” he said. “You and Lorenz go get him back to normal after he’s had his breakdown. The rest of you, I need you to go around the monastery walls, find any breaches, and then fix them up as best you can. Hilda, come with me.”

* 

They hurried down the concave steps onto the courtyard. The dark was stifling, illuminated only by the few still-burning bonfires; the struggling bulk of the monastery took on a reddish hue, shadows splaying long from their feet.

“There are five heavy Imperial battalions stationed south of Garreg Mach, just at the border of their uncontested territory” Claude said. “That’s what I know. Your turn, Shamir.”

“Beasts,” Shamir said. “At least three, siege-reared. The report just came in that they got a shipment from the capital, and they’re moving. Best case scenario, they’ll be here around dawn tomorrow. Worst—”

“Look!” Hilda exclaimed, pointing at the cloud of dust rising from the direction of the town. Shamir swore loudly in Dagdan.

“We need to get the commanders in position. Now.”

“Leave it to Lorenz and Leonie,” Claude said, picking up the pace. “If her reason doesn’t work, his drivel might. Who’s currently leading the front guard in town?”

“Cyril,” Shamir said, and Claude stopped abruptly. “And Flayn. Ostensibly as support, but Seteth isn’t there.”

“Noted,” he said, stifling his expression in the cuff of his sleeve. “I’ll scout and pull the battalions back, if needed. Shamir, you should stay here. There are other ways into the monastery that we won’t know about, aren’t there? That’s how you got behind me.”

She chuckled. “You bet your shiny arse they are. Yes, I’ll pick up the slack your people have left behind, and then get them in charge of some troops.” 

“You’re the best, Shamir,” Claude called earnestly, causing her to scrunch the entire emanciated expression into a grimace of distaste, and pulled Hilda’s arm as he broke into a sprint.

His heart tightened painfully as he saw Huma claw at the splints of her wings. The wyvern’s head turned after him; she gave an ear-splitting outraged screech when he climbed into the saddle of the Goneril beast behind Hilda.

“Sorry,” he muttered under his breath as they took off.

The wind hit his face like a sudden burst of frost, ground disappearing under them. Claude forced his eyes wide until they watered, fixing his gaze southward. Ahead of them a fiery light blinked into existence, reddening the ink-black landscape of the town.

“Hello, Claude,” said Hilda, twisting her head back to look at him. He patted her waist where he held on.

“Hey,” he said. She looked ahead again, the wheezing sound of wind stretching in between them. Its noise drowned out the silence, filling his ears with familiar, safe ringing. Between his almost-death, reunion, truce, and council, they hadn’t had much chance to speak.

“You’re so much _work_ ,” Hilda said finally.

“At least I keep things interesting,” he said into her back, which suddenly seemed to pull endlessly far away. _Lady Goneril, the Roundtable commands._ “Weren’t you dying to get away from Holst, anyway?”

“Oh, _please_ .” Her shoulders shook slightly, a snort or a shudder. “Also, if you say one more thing about dying to do anything, Claude von Riegan, I will _slap you_.”

“So ladylike,” he said, airily. They were getting closer; the red light stretched until it was clearly a fire consuming the town. Behind it loomed dark, inhuman shadows.

They had been-- _friends_. Something still held, across the war and distance. Still light, dancing steps over the surface of anything remotely sincere. He wondered, sometimes, about her own reasons to skip around it; but it wasn’t as if he were the one to talk. It was just a tenuous tether after all, little more, made ever so fragile by the webs of power that held them. Still--

“Holst said that you keep pestering him about chess,” Hilda said after a moment. “With less than half a set. I told him you’re just a weirdo like that—”

“Holst’s a tattle,” said Claude.

“Here’s what I’m wondering, though,” said Hilda, ignoring him. ”So the towers move in straight lines, and the bishops in diagonals, and the horse things in— zigzags, _whatever_ —”

“Didn’t you have a chess tutor?”

“—and the queen, ” Hilda said decisively, “in all directions, doesn’t that kinda mean that she’s more important to get than all that?”

Claude exhaled. “Not exactly,” he said. “We can still pull an easy win without her.”

Hilda pulled at the reins. The wyvern lowered her course, diving into the thick cloud of smoke that spread from the town.

" _That_ ’s your lying voice,” she said. 

They were close to the rooftops now. The horizon had shrunk in the fumes, the fog thick with the clatter and noise of battle. Claude pulled his cloak over his mouth to avoid breathing it in.

“I’ll take the ground. Cover me,” he said, giving her waist one last squeeze, and jumped off.

* 

The dilapidated rooftop shuddered precariously as he rolled on impact, but held his weight. Claude slid down the rain gutter and sped along the street towards the town square, past the stained wooden signboards hanging over empty windows. _Alfran Foundry – Madam Beauty’s Tailoring – The Bull’s Head—_ all dilapidated and empty, their pathetic silhouettes vanishing in the fog.

 _No alcohol,_ Byleth had said, as the nine of them had poured into the warmly lit inn. They had collapsed into their seats with a chorus of groans, singing the praises of indoors after a long wintertime mission. _One drink each. And yes, mead counts as alcohol, Hilda._

 _How about mulled wine?_ he’d said over Hilda’s whining protest. _It’s tradition around these parts, Teach. And who are we to denounce tradition?_

 _No alcohol, Claude,_ she’d said, turning to give him a _look_. But there had been a smile tucked in the crinkles of her eyes, and it’d only grown at his wink.

 _How about this,_ he’d pitched down conspiratorially, - _\- you— order some mulled wine for yourself._

 _I might,_ she’d said, heading to the bar. She’d returned with two steaming mugs of crimson liquid and, with a blank expression, passed him one.

 _You are the Valkyrie of legend,_ he’d said. _The greatest woman to have graced this earth. Your glory will— hang on. Teach, is this cranberry juice? Teach?!_

A bomb went off ahead of him.

He leapt into the cover of a half-demolished inn as the ground vibrated under his feet. Fire blossomed across his path, and Claude swerved, narrowly avoiding another projectile. He nocked an arrow in the direction of a half-visible shadow that rose above him – a thin silhouette of a hooded mage – released it and ran, not waiting to check its mark. 

The gremory gave chase. A black burst of miasma splattered behind his feet, burning holes through his travelling trousers. It was a von Vestra mage; Claude remembered that particular vicious burn from Gronder. He had to hope that it had only been a single scout.

No such luck. Ahead of him, there was another clatter of boots along the alley’s cobblestones and a Bolganone flew out of the fog, whizzing past his elbow. Claude took a sharp corner, shooting blind into the welling smoke, and this time was graced with a cry of pain; he ran toward it until a dim silhouette revealed itself in the milk-like air, and with his other hand reached for the knife.

The mage struggled in his grasp, crying out for help, a long-feathered arrow thrust through his thigh; but he went limp as Claude's hunting blade carved a red valley across his throat. 

Claude stared at him for a second longer, suddenly numb. He had not killed a man for three years. 

A spell cut the fog. Claube crouched behind the freshly-made corpse as the dark magic crashed into its flesh. Someone called in the smoke ahead of him; more silhouettes began to clear in the looming shadow, tall and cloaked. He was being surrounded. 

“Hilda?!” he cried, turning the corner. The fog was pushing itself through his makeshift mask, hot and choking. What in the nine hells were they burning? In front of him, the mages' hands glowed with murderously violet light.

The voice that answered was not the one he’d expected. 

“Claude! Claude von Riegan!”

He reached up on instinct, catching onto the hind legs of a pegasus that lowered its flight over him; it rose up and pulled him over another roof. A bomb exploded where he had just stood, a caustic heatwave reaching his cheeks with sickly warmth. The pegasus only touched down long enough for Claude to clamber upon its back, grasping at the edges of the saddle toward familiar green hair. More spells flew under its hooves as it rose.

Then, abruptly, magic ceased to fly at them. A battalion of grey-clad cavaliers descended upon the Imperial scouts, engaging them instead, and their own pegasus escaped beyond their spell range undisturbed.

“I would have wished for better circumstances for you and I to reunite,” said Flayn, removing the shawl covering her mouth for long enough to give him a smile, “but I am glad to see you even so.”

“How many demonic beasts, Flayn?” Claude demanded, voice still choked by the smoke. Flayn turned around sheepishly, her green locks made grey in the blazing fire.

“Apologies. It is a gripping fight, is it not? Ah-- doing it again. Three, Claude. And they carry this most awful powder that burns like the Valley of Torment itself!”

“Noted,” Claude said, nocking an arrow. _Awful burning powder._ Mages were a given, especially since he had a suspicion whose voice he’d heard approaching in the fog; but the powder posed a different threat whatsoever. “We need to fall back to the monastery, face the bulk of them there. However many soldiers you have here, it’s not enough.” 

“I understand. Just a moment, please.” Turning away from him, Flayn leant forward along the neck of her pegasus and roared, “ _FALL BACK!_ ”

The soldiers beneath her bellowed in acknowledgement. The pegasus rose up, joining the rest of the mounted unit. Suddenly the air was thick with beating wings, feathered and leathery alike.

“Uh,” Claude said.

Flayn threw her head back to grace him with a beatific smile. “We must make time to converse, Claude. I hear you have been up to all kinds of exciting endeavours!”

Claude pressed a blood-stained glove to his heart. “But of course. What are you doing around tea time tomorrow?”

Her smile brightened, mirth crinkling the corners of her green eyes. Then it snuffed out immediately as another deafening explosion shook the town, enshrouding the horizon with a thick cloud of smoke and ash. Out flew the Goneril wyvern; it was followed by a smaller, brown mount with grey insignia.

“Pull back!” yelled Cyril, axe black with blood. He was taller than Claude had remembered, broad shoulders beneath an almost-black head of hair, teeth flashing white in a face dark with ash. “Pull back to the monastery!”

Claude stared at him. Then he pulled at Flayn’s hand on the reins. “Can you get me a ride to the loud guy over there?”

“Of course,” Flayn said graciously, and the pegasus soared through the air. Claude slipped his feet out of the stirrups and stood up, balancing precariously on the saddle; then, Cyril’s eyes opening wide in shock and recognition, he leapt through the air to latch onto the wyvern’s harness.

“What the—”

“No time,” Claude snapped in Almyran, grabbing his arm. “You gotta tell me whether that was gunpowder. You saw them up close, didn’t you?”

Cyril shook him off violently. Claude windmilled his arms, seconds from falling. “I don’t know what your problem is, but you gotta stop it!” Cyril yelled back in Fódlani, his axe narrowly missing Claude’s ear as he swung it down.

“ _Gunpowder,_ ” Claude repeated again, insistently native consonants grating in the back of his throat. “You don’t— _you don’t understand_?!”

“Stop pestering me,” Cyril hissed, turning back. “I don’t wanna— I’m not your pal, I don’t want anything to do with Almyra! All those missives— those dumb people— you think just because we look the same, you have some kind of right to me?!”

Claude flinched. He pushed back against the saddle, the smoke thick in his eyes.

“Listen to me, Cyril,” he said in Fódlani. “There’s something I need you to tell me. The demonic beasts are carrying some kind of explosive powder. Is it _magic_ , or _alchemy_?”

There was a long, silent pause.

“Magic,” Cyril said, curt and unwilling, and Claude sagged in the saddle.

“Good,” he muttered to himself. “One enemy at a time. Cyril—”

“Shut up,” Cyril barked without looking back. “Just- shut up! ”

Claude fell silent. The monastery loomed in the darkness ahead, the sprawling mass of soldiers hurtling below them. 

Before the wyvern landed, he jumped off and rolled away, not sparing a single glance back before breaking into a sprint up. Hilda and Flayn hurried behind him.

* 

Shamir awaited on the battlements, torch in hand. “Catherine and Alois are in command of the right and left flank respectively,” she said. “They’ve got your people in charge of squads. Meanwhile, Seteth’s still snivelling, and since this is the last thing I’m dealing with on the front lines, he will be taking the inside of the monastery.” She raised a hand, stopping Flayn’s immediate question. “How many?”

“At least a thousand,” Hilda said. “Plus three of those monsters. They have some kind of explosive powder on them, and it _smells._ ”

“We can do this,” Claude said. “We outnumber them at least five to one.” Then he paused, an idea worming itself up to his conscious brain. “But that doesn’t make sense. Unless they aren’t here to take the monastery.”

“But—“ Flayn said.

“They’re here to destroy it,” Shamir said flatly.

“On the night of the Millennium Festival,” said Claude. He gave a bright chuckle. “Well considered, Edelgard. Either take the enemy’s symbolic stronghold on its most hallowed day, or bring it all crashing down.”

 _Claude_ ,” Hilda hissed.

“What? All I said is that the idea makes sense! From her side,” Claude said. He opened his arms wide, victorious. “And now that we’ve figured it out, all we have to do is— not let her do it. That’s all. That's the scheme. We win, and we get to reclaim the holy symbol and divine mandate.” And, more importantly, their _home._ Whatever the Imperial princess was telling herself, Claude very much doubted her desire to conquer Garreg Mach was entirely pragmatic.

That was a moment that a flaming red ball of light chose to soar over their heads.

“DOWN!” Claude bellowed, falling flat over Flayn to cover her with his body. The bomb shook the monastery, sending a shockwave of smoke and dust. The ground rumbled ominously under their feet. Another one soared up, and he braced for impact— but when he dared look, it hung suspended in the air, dark magic crackling over it.

“Thanks, Lysithea,” Claude breathed. Then he climbed to his feet. “We need to take out those monsters with ballistae!”

“Alois is on it,” said Shamir, pointing to her left. Their flank was pouring out in a grey tide to engage the enemy soldiers, battle cries vibrating in the air ahead. “One of you should probably go help him.” Claude made to jump off the battlements, but her sharp-nailed fingers closed on his shoulder. “Not you, golden boy. Someone who can give air support.”

Bile rose in his throat at the thought of Huma. “Hilda, you go,” he said with a nod, and she gave him a narrow-eyed look before turning on her heel and walking off. The hot pink of her hair disappeared quickly in the encroaching smoke.

“What happened to my brother?” demanded Flayn, tugging at Shamir’s arm.

“Nope,” Shamir said, turning away. “No. Claude can tell you.”

Claude opened his mouth to answer - and froze. 

His mind whirred suddenly, pieces of the puzzle coming together to reveal a horrendous, horrendously obvious _danger_.

“The earthquake,” he said incomprehensibly. Shamir raised her eyebrow at him. “No— this entire place is already a ruin. We need to get out of here right now.”

“What?” said Shamir and Flayn at the same time.

“ _Tunnels_ ,” Claude said, whirling in place. “I knew they were there! The pantry, Abyss, and if all of this place goes as deep as the Holy Tomb, then— oh, Edelgard, ” he laughed, high-pitched, “your plan was rubbish until _I_ showed up.”

“Claude,” Flayn said, eyes wide, “you frighten me.”

“Don’t you see?” Claude said frantically, tapping his foot against the stone. It rang hollow; a cellar or an escape tunnel beneath. “This mountain is riddled with tunnels. The Abyss, the Holy Tomb, however many other secrets Rhea buried here, it’s like— like _lace_ with some pretty stonework on top. It wouldn’t take much to upset all this balance, I don’t know, maybe an _earthquake_? And if you start raining bombs on top of all this...”

Colour slowly drained from Shamir’s face. “How certain are you?” she said.

“Pretty damn certain,” Claude said and closed his fists. “We need to evacuate. Overground, Abyssians, whoever remains in town, all of it. If this is a cave-in, no-one will survive it.”

Shamir crossed eyes with him and nodded sharply. Then she shoved the torch into his arms and leapt down the battlements, curling herself into a tight ball and rolling against the sharp rocks. “Disengage!” she roared, and the Knights of Seiros startled at the command. “Disengage and move away from the monastery, now! Go, go, go! ”

“Flayn,” Claude said, turning on his heel. It was almost too jarring to watch the immediate disarray that descended upon their troops, as they were told to stop winning the battle and abandon the freshly reclaimed stronghold. The Imperial troops immediately took advantage, their left flank advancing upon the flailing Knights. “I need you to gather everyone that’s in the monastery right now, and make sure they’re out.”

“I will do so,” Flayn said, face growing determined. “But you do owe me an explanation after all of this ends, Claude von Riegan! And where are you to go?”

 _Abyss_ , he opened his mouth to say. _There are people to save there too._

And then he looked north, where the single wall of the cathedral was red with firelight, shattered rosette looking over the crevasse like a blinded eye.

He shouldn't. He should _not,_ it didn't matter. Abyss mattered. He could not afford to make an enemy out of Yuri, if the people down there did not survive the cave-in. He should _not--_

An impotent scream pushed up his throat.

“Change of plans,” he said instead. “Do you know about the Abyss?”

“Yes, although—”

“Once you’ve spoken with Seteth,” Claude said intently, placing his hands on either side of her shoulders, “you’ll go into the Abyss, you will invoke the name of Yuri Leclerc and Claude von Riegan, and you will ask them all to evacuate immediately. Do you understand me, Flayn?”

Flayn’s eyes were wide. “Yes, but—”

“Thank you,” he said, squeezing her shoulders, and threw himself into a run. “One more thing,” he cried, “I’m taking your pegasus!”

“Claude von Riegan, you come back here this instant!”

 _Can’t_ , he thought. _I’ve chased her this far._

The pegasus gave only a perfunctory struggle before taking flight. Its feathery wings unnerved him, flapping unfamiliar white at the edge of vision; but it was a nimble beast all the same, avoiding the projectiles that swarmed in the air. The ground rumbled with a terrifying low note, making his stomach churn. He just needed a moment longer, and if he had to pray, he would pray to all the gods he remembered, to _Sothis_ , if only they would - not _take her away again—_

The seafoam of her hair was the only remaining flicker of colour in the falling night.

He landed gracelessly, relief shaking his fingers. She had lain back down in the stream, white-faced, close-eyed, and lifeless; a figure of blue-veined marble. When he reached out to tighten his fingers on her arms, they were just as cold as before.

“Leave me,” she said without opening her eyes. Claude set his jaw.

“I’m not asking,” he said.

He wedged his arms in between her and the shallow bed of the stream, its ice-cold water soaking through his sleeves. She was heavy, heavier than a human woman; but a man didn't train with Failnaught without learning a thing or two about how to handle not-entirely-human weighs. Grunting with effort, Claude wobbled back towards the pegasus, the ground humming ominously beneath him. The air was growing thick with smoke.

“Teach,” he wheezed, “if five years of not eating does that to you, I— _nngh—_ I’d hate to carry you after a feast—”

He strung her before him in the saddle and pushed his heels into the mount’s sides.

A whizzing noise sounded overhead, and he looked up to face a burning projectile poised to hit the centre of the cathedral—

“UP!” he bellowed, and the pegasus soared. The bomb hit the ground with a deafening noise. Five more followed in quick succession, the grounds of the cathedral wreathed in fire and smoke.

And then— then the mountain sighed beneath them. There was a moment of quiet, of the earth holding its breath.

Then, with a crushing sound, the entire monastery caved into the chasm.

Claude stared in disbelief.

_No. Not this. Not this place. No. No—_

“Earth was born once,” said the woman who was not Byleth, strung gracelessly over the back of the pegasus like a set of travelling pouches, “and it will one day die.”

Her words reached him through a thick fog of incomprehension.

Below him, the ruins of Garreg Mach slowly crumbled down, spires and belltowers tracing arches of dust as they fell. The entrance hall - the training grounds - the student dormitories, the courtyards, the dining hall -

_\-- a young man with an ill-fitting name and a pipe dream of a plan, scaling the slick stone and mortar with his moonlit shadow ballooning below him. The Goddess Tower awaited. And inside, a woman that had chosen him over much better alternatives, had trusted him despite all evidence to the contrary._

_Shall we pray? he asked, grinning, winking to invite her into the half-mystical, exhilarating absurdity of it all. She brought her wrists to her chest, smiling at him with gentle eyes, and in that moment he could believe all he’d ask would come to be._

Below the spread of the pegasus’s wings, the Goddess Tower crumbled into dust.

Garreg Mach was no more. 

His seat of power, and all the seeds of hope buried within.

“Well,” he said after an eternity, with as much spite as he could fit into the words that suddenly made no sense at all, “aren’t you happy you’re not a part of that particular earth? Eh, _Teach_?”

“No,” she said. She turned to look up, eyes piercing through him, green and endless. “I am the sea.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to amiah and AriTred, whose feedback made this chapter a lot better. Would love to hear your thoughts on this New And Improved Fall of Garreg Mach. Let me know!
> 
> (now let me get back to chipping away at the aftermath--)

**Author's Note:**

> [Yell at me on Twitter!](https://twitter.com/wearwind_ao3)


End file.
